The New York Times counts four different legislators trying to attack the epidemic of 'Viva Viagra!' ads from different angles: they violate decency standards, they promote dangerous overuse of risky drugs, they're a poor use of the tax code. Which is fucking true, come on:

Representative Jerrold Nadler, Democrat of New York, has introduced a bill called the Say No to Drug Ads Act. It would amend the federal tax code to prevent pharmaceutical companies from deducting the cost of direct-to-consumer drug advertisements as a business expense.

We, the consumers, should be allowed to deduct as a "business expense" the Tivos we use to fast-forward past Cialis ads during sporting events, the double-paned windows we install to prevent our neighbors from hearing genital wart elixir ads blaring from our living rooms, and the pitchforks we buy, to deal with any pharmaceutical marketing executives we might come across.

And speaking of pharmaceutical marketing executives! One of them offers the defense that hey, TV ads aren't such a big deal; after all, "drug companies spent much more on direct marketing to physicians."

Like we said: pitchforks. Throw us this bone, Congress. We know you're not going to give us a good national health care plan. At least let us watch a fucking football game in peace.
[NYT]

Let's go through these, shall we?

• Yet another ethics complaint was filed against Palin in Alaska yesterday. What for? Oh, remember when we learned that Palin, great American fiscal conservative and hater of wasteful spending that she is, was charging the state a travel per diem to work out of her own home in Wasilla? Well apparently she's continued to do it, pocketing several thousand dollars of "bonus" income in the process. So dang mavericky!
  
  
• Palin spoke to the Anchorage Daily News about her resignation and once again offered a mystery grab-bag of reasons for her abrupt departure.

  It's a combination of things that has brought me to this place of knowing. I love Alaskans too much to put them through a lame duck session heading into my final year in office; I was going to be honest and tell them I'm not going to run for re-election. I'm not going to let Alaskans go through a year of stymied, paralyzed administration and not getting anything done. I'm going to let Sean Parnell take this and we will see that things will let up...With Sean in the governor's seat it won't be the politics of personal destruction, I don't believe...Especially when all these lawmakers are lining up for office. Their desire would be to clobber the administration left and right so that they can position themselves for office. I'm not going to put Alaskans through that.

• Pill-addled party boss Rush Limbaugh still sees Palin as a viable leader of the Republican party. He took time away from being a Viagra-fueled sex tourist to make a statement about her on his show.

  These people saying that she's an instant target because she quit, that's just inside-the-Beltway formulaic and she's not that. If anything this woman, her m.o. is outside-the-box and not formulaic. All I know is that she is going to continue to fire-up people in the conservative Republican base as often as she speaks to 'em.

• Despite the fact that most of the people closest to her had no idea she was resigning last Friday, ABC is reporting that Palin consulted with Dick Cheney and Rudy Giuliani about the move.
  
  
• And finally, there's the inevitable freakout by Hitler over Sarah Palin's quitting. These are always funny, and this one is oh so very funny. Even funnier than the Michael Jackson death freakout, in my opinion.
  
  
  
  
  
  New Ethics Complain Filed Against Palin [Mudflats]
  Palin Says Ethics Inquiries Paralyzing [ADN]
  Sarah Palin May Have Quit, But That Won't Stop Her From Running For President in 2012, Says Rush Limbaugh [Daily News]
  Palin Called GOP Leaders Before Quitting [ABC]
  Hitler/Palin vid via YouTube
  Pic via Runner's World

Many of you have probably seen the wince-inducing "Viva Viagra" TV spot now airing in the U.S. (Fun/sad fact: the drummer in the band is Dorsey Wright—Cleon from "The Warriors.") But what are Viagra commercials like in Canada? Turkey? In woman-hating Saudi Arabia? Well, they are all both more entertaining and more effective. To the videos!

First stop on the artificial hard-on ad tour is Canada. Much like here in puritanical America, erectile dysfunction advertising up north can't say anything remotely sexual. A couple of years ago, Pfizer was forced to pull a U.S. TV ad in which the V in the Viagra logo rose up behind the head of a suddenly flush man, forming glowing blue devil horns. To avoid any such marketing coitus interruptus, Toronto ad agency Taxi decided that saying nothing and yet, wink wink, everything was the best approach. I know it gave me a "chuckwubble"!

Next up (semi-heh) is Turkey. Though the directing and editing and acting and music on this 60-second spot are amateurish (it would have been much better as a :30), it still serves as a fairly effective product demonstration. Put blue pill in mouth and—boing!

Finally, this is how they sell stiffy-stiffeners in Saudi Arabia. It's my favorite of the three because it's brief, simple, cheap, and it does the best job of branding Viagra: Blue=Hard.

This concludes your world E.D. tour. I hear through ad scuttlebutt that Pfizer absolutely adores the Viva Viagra abomination (which is via impotent, bloated agency McCann Erickson). This makes me sad. Because just like with condom advertising, America comes up limp again.

Previously: The Great Diaper Wars